News

Now the CAA puts small aviation businesses in its sights

Drop ’til you pop – the CAA will grab $2.50 every time someone falls out

Many of us may be thinking that, this time around, GA has been let off lightly in the CAA’s triennial funding review. But we could be very wrong.

Did you know, for example, that the CAA is reducing charges for many big operators such as airports and airlines, but plans to radically increase them for many small GA commercial operators, if it can convince the Minister of Transport?

The CAA could once again inflict serious damage on the little guys – but this time there will be knock-on effects for local businesses and our country’s important tourism sector.

We think this needs a closer look, and we are asking commercial GA operators for some pretty urgent assistance. The GAA has already written to Transport Minister Simon Bridges about this (and, for good measure, we reminded him of the harm done to GA by the last round of increases signed off by his predecessor, Gerry Brownlee).

The GAA is asking commercial GA operators:

1 – Do you support the introduction of a new levy on GA commercial?

2 – The CAA’s proposal is that you will no longer pay for regular audits. How much do you presently pay (on an annual basis) for CAA audits?

3 – Looking at the table below, what could be the cost to your business of the new charges? Remember to remove the annual cost of your routine audit(s).

CAR 121/125/135 Freight only

$3.00 per tonne plus participation levy

CAR 121/125 less than 20,000 pax

$5.50 per flight hour plus participation levy

CAR 135

$6.50 per flight hour plus participation levy

CAR 115 Adventure Aviation

$12.50 per flight hour plus participation levy

CAR 115 Parachute/Paraglide

$2.50 per descent

CAR137

$0.87 per tonne applied plus participation levy

The estimated cost to my business would be: $

4 – Are you aware that charges for all other certificate holders (e.g. Airlines paying pax levy, Airports, Airways, Engineering, Aviation Training Providers, Registered Cargo Agents) will be reducing? Do you consider this fair and equitable?

5 – Do you wish to participate in further work we do in opposing these new levy payments?

We will use this information to prepare more opposition to the CAA proposals.

The GAA is asking the Director to reveal details of all 111 responses to the second stage of consultation. We know that the CAA has already given that information, in a neatly bound document, to a select group of its customers.

We are also collecting information on whether you are receiving “value for money” from the services CAA presently provides. We’d welcome your comments (either positive or negative) on this subject.